Exchange
by Fair-Ithil
Summary: He gives her the sky in exchange for the sea and she accepts...The gift a mantle, the start of a legend. Featuring Denethor, Finduilas,Boromir, Faramir and Eowyn


**Disclaimer: Do you own this? Yes. Are you sure? No…okay you caught me. I don't own the LotR.**

**A/N:** So I'm rereadin' the Trilogy as it is a October and Trilogy month. I got to 'The Steward and the King' and was accosted by all sorts of bunnies. And this was born. It's weird, I've never written Denethor and only briefly written Finduilas, let alone Denethor/Finduilas…Anyway this does have F/E at the end and while I'm not at all sure what the heck I was trying to do, I like it.

Read, enjoy, let me know what you think.

* * *

He gives her the sky in exchange for the sea and she accepts.

A smile on rosy lips, whispers of raven hair dancing about them as she declares her willingness to see the White City and dwell there at his side. "Lord" she calls him with a giggle. "My Lord, my _husband_" The words warm him and he smiles in turn, one hand on her slim waist the other threading ebony locks. She shines before him, something warm and soft after too long a stay in the shadow. "_Love_" he calls her and she smiles all the wider. _Love and life and warmth._

She will save him.

-

She brings a light to his hall that comforts them all as the eastern malice grows. She gives him a son, a strong lad who will bear the white standard in glory, for darkness grows with their son and she dims as fear appears in her eyes. She bears him a second son, and she smiles a little less as her stomach swells and she tires easier and has less time to offer comfort as she hides away in her birthing chamber. When the second is born he is weeks early, a tiny thing that does not wail so much as he inspects his surroundings in a fashion unbefitting a babe. "_Loves_" she calls them, and hordes them away within the folds of sky she wraps around herself.

But love does not save her as the fear in her eyes steadily grows and she asks him leave to return to the sea. "That they," she pleas for her sons "may not have to endure the Nameless One as we have had to endure him."

"They cannot run from duty. Neither shall you." He tells her for he has no time now for pretty words and gentleness.

" My Lord Steward I beg—" She begs and flinches at the sound of his fury as he tells her again she cannot leave.

She retreats to the nursery and takes comfort in her immortal sky.

-

The years are unkind and she fades with every passing day until at long last she little more than a fragment, a shadow and a thought that lingers in the weave of a mantle, the grey of his young son's eyes.

The eastern wind mocks him and he sees his city failing and the world turns to ash around him.

His sons grow.

The elder one swift with a sword, a valiant leader and warrior, he will lead Gondor when his time comes. The second is indecisive in his father's eyes, taking too longer to ponder, not enough to act. He watches through narrowed eyes as his son runs to greet with open arms the Grey Pilgrim, to hear his tales of travel and legends of yore.

A day comes when his wife's kindred come to his city and share tales as bothersome as the wizard's, tales that stir the bitterness of loss beneath his breast. "I remember the stars…" His eldest son says one day as they talk in his study. "I recall she ever wore the stars." He smiles at his son's words and calls in secret for her mantle to be gifted to him.

He would have his son remember her in fairer light than he.

What he does not know then, what none of them know then, is that two years to the night, one son will pass it another in farewell.

-

"_Twice has the water's flow stolen love from me,"_ he thinks as his youngest, and now only living, son hands him the fragmented remains of the Horn of Gondor.

"I saw him, father," the boy starts, his grey eyes bright and weary, "I saw him in a white boat, and his face was all alight. The Great River carried him out to sea…" And in those moments he does not know whether to weep for what he has lost or curse what stands still before him.

He rises without a word and thinks he should have seen this doom.

-

'Wizard's pupil' he curses him, ever trying to imamate the gracious kings of old. He knows what his son has done, knows he has let the Ring of Power slip from within his grasp. He cannot fulfill the duty of one son, and now he fails for two.

The Eastern sky is all but black and the wind stale within his lungs. War is upon them now and there will be no escape.

He looks at the son before him and wishes to turn the very current of time and exchange him for another.

"Since you are robbed of Boromir, I will go and do what I can in his stead— if you command it."

"I do so," and he sends another son to death and darkness.

-

His city burns and he will burn also.

The water will not steal this son from him, they will go in the eternal blaze, the smothering heat, and turn to ash before the enemy can strike them.

So, in a fit of madness and flames passes Denethor, son of Ecthelion.

-

The king calls for him and he knows not whether to answer. For here, lost on the brink, he can hear them. Mother and brother once more, calling to him with unintelligible words. He knows only what his before him and feels his heart wrench within his breast. He has tired of war but knows it is not for him to return to the Halls of his forefather's.

Not yet.

"_You must go on for now…" _

Pushing against the shadow, yet away from the light, he answers his king.

-

She is quiet.

Her flaxen hair, unbound, flies on the Northern wind and she looks for a sign, of victory, of doom. She awaits her fate.

He looks at her with tired eyes and sees the hard angles of her face, the dark half circles that mar the skin beneath her bright eyes. He looks at her bound arm and sees _her:_ A lady proud and stubborn and wounded by war and silence alike.

She has seen the darkest brink and returned, though some piece of her still tarries in shadowed lands.

She turns towards him and they begin to walk again, back towards the Houses and their confinement, and he takes with him the picture of her atop the walls. And when phantom flames rouse him from his sleep he sits by his window and thinks of her.

-

"If the battle is lost," She begins on their fourth day together as they stand once more on the walls looking out, "what shall you do?"

He turns away from her and stares at the distant sun, unsure of what to answer. "Have you no hope Lady?"

"Only fools hope…" She whispers and he is struck by the words. The silence settles upon them and he feels her eyes upon him, eyes that cut into him as surely as swords. "What shall you do then Lord?"

"I shall fight and fulfill my duty to this city and its people."

He thinks of his father then, of their last parting. If the tide turned against the White City again the city would never hold, but he would not so easily abandon the city or his hope.

He turns back to her and is worried when he spots the tears in her eyes.

-

He gifts her with the stars on the fifth day.

She thanks him, a smile on dry lips, flaxen hair like a golden crown upon her head, pale hands, sword hardened with worry-ridden fingers, taking his own briefly as he sets it upon her shoulders.

They walk together from the Houses, side by side, and she whispers her desire to be free once more. He tells her of Ithilien, of the river which flows out onto the sea.

"I would like to see the sea." She says quietly as they approach the walls and fall silent.

They stand together once more and look on with fear and awe alike as the shadow swells in the East and falls until it is no more then a memory on the horizon.

All his limbs are light and his heart is clear and the voices in his mind speak no more of darkness or doubt. He looks to her and sees with her hope for coming days. He sees a garden across the river and children, strong and safe. He sees nights of endless stars, perhaps more beautiful than the ones about her shoulders.

She will save him.

**End **


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